Jaime Pressly is probably best known for making people laugh, but in Last Shot, she gets to show just how good she is at drama. As a mother suddenly faced with raising a son she barely knows, she gives a performance that’s raw and emotional. For Pressly, who started her career in drama, the script was something she couldn’t put down.
Directed by Andy Palmer, the film follows a young basketball prodigy, played by Dylan Friedman, whose life is upended by his father’s death. Now living with his largely absent mother (Pressly), he tries to find his way back to the game while also dealing with grief and figuring out where he fits in his mother’s life. The cast also includes Johnny Simmons, Laraine Newman, Bron Dvi nd Michael Rapaport.
I talked with Pressly, Friedman and Palmer about bringing those emotional scenes to life, including the hands-on coaching Pressly gave her young co-star and the challenges of shooting some of their toughest moments on just the second day. They also discussed why comedic actors can be so good at drama, the pressure Friedman felt taking on the lead in a film his father helped write. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Watch the full conversation in the video below or on our YouTube channel.
Jaime, you’re brilliant in your comedic roles, but here, you blew me away. You were fantastic.
Jaime Pressly: Thank you, I really appreciate that. I’ve got to say, I owe it to Andy and Todd [Friedman] for even thinking of me for the role, because most people don’t. They assume they want to put me in the funny role, but I started out in drama 30 years ago.
When I was doing Mom, we had great comedy coming from real-life drama, so we had the best of both worlds on that show. I craved the days that I would be able to go to work and play the dramatic side of the character.
So, this was a breath of fresh air for me when I read the script. Andy sent me an email, and I assumed it was going to be a comedy. But I read it immediately…
Andy Palmer: That day.
Jaime Pressly: Yeah, I read it that day. I was so enthralled after the first couple of pages because I realized, “Oh my God, this isn’t a comedy. It’s a drama.”
Originally, the first script I read started out with the hospital scene, right away, I’m reading that my character’s breaking down, that her son’s in the hospital. I’m like, “Oh my God.” I wanted to tell him right away, “Yes.” But then I was like, “Finish the script.” I couldn’t put it down. It was such a beautiful story.
Andy Palmer: I watched all of Mom. I loved that series, and Jaime’s 100 percent right. The way they would transcend comedy and drama, deep trauma, so effortlessly from episode to episode, I had no doubt.
But also, I think comedy is the hardest genre. If you are a good comedian, it’s so much more difficult. People don’t realize that.
Jaime Pressly: Everybody thinks comedy is easy and drama is more difficult, but it’s the complete opposite because comedy is all about timing.
Andy Palmer: If you look at the leads in this film – Jaime, Johnny Simmons, Laraine Newman, Michael Rapaport – they’re all comedic actors who are also amazing in drama. I think the greatest dramatic actors are comedians.
There’s always a place that good comedy comes from, and usually it’s a dark place somewhere.
Dylan, did you know how to play basketball before you shot this?
Dylan Friedman: Yeah, I used to play on a club team, and I’ve been playing my whole life. I knew how to play basketball before.
Some of the shots you made were pretty darn good. Was that all you, or was it Andy and his movie magic?
Andy Palmer: We tried not to do that. You’ll see a couple of times in the movie where somebody shoots, then you have the cutaway to the hoop and the basket goes in, if it was specific and we didn’t get it in the moment. But for the most part, I tried to gravitate toward any shots that were totally real.
That first three that Dylan hits in the movie, that was 100 percent him. These kids, besides being great actors, made some pretty incredible shots.
Dylan, you’re also the lead here, and your dad’s a writer on it. Did you feel any pressure because of that?
Dylan Friedman: Yeah, I definitely felt pressure. But everybody on set welcomed me in and made the pressure go away. Jaime, Andy, Johnny—everybody made me more comfortable.
Jaime, I saw that you were helping Dylan out with the scenes and his acting.
Jaime Pressly: I was really tough on him. In real life, he’s never suffered any kind of real trauma, and that’s a hard thing for a kid to pull up when they have nothing to reference.
For instance, in the hallway scene, when they’re going at it, I went to Andy and said, “Hey, is it okay if I do my thing and get him there?” He was like, “Go. Go do your thing.”
We would just keep running it over and over. When we were on his close-up, I’d be off camera screaming at him, literally, “Get angry. You hate me. What is wrong with…,” because he would get this little grin in all these scenes. I’m like, “No, you’re not happy right now. You can’t be happy.”
He comes from this really great family and great parents, and he’s never really suffered any of this crazy trauma that his character did. It was a tough order for him, but he got there. He did it.
Andy Palmer: I think he’s incredible in the film. We threw those real heavy dramatic moments at them on day two of the movie, by the way.
It would be nice when you have a budget to say, On an indie film, you schedule almost according to location. When can we go from one location to the next?
Because on an indie film, it would be nice when you have a budget and you’re like, “It would be nice for the actors to get to this place, so we’ll schedule accordingly.” You schedule almost according to location. When can we go from one location to the next and stuff like that? And that’s hard for the actors, because we oftentimes throw them in weird emotional places because everything is dictated by, “What day can we get into the music studio? What day does the mansion work for us?”
Jaime Pressly: What can we afford?
Andy Palmer: Yeah, exactly. It all comes down to financially affording where we’re going. Then you put that on the actors to have to bounce back and forth between these very light moments and hard moments. Luckily, these guys are all incredible, and they just do it.
Jaime, you have some really emotional scenes here. Was there anything you had to do differently when preparing for them?
Jaime Pressly: I’m 49, and I have a lot to draw from. Unlike Dylan, I have tons of drama to pull from—all kinds of things. Us actors, we compartmentalize everything, and then you bring it forward.
The thing that was hard for me was trying to relate to this character who never raised her kid, had no maternal instincts, and literally was content with his whole life and paying for him and his dad and not really being a part of his life at all. I have three boys. I can’t imagine that.
But my character came from an asshole father and a mother who was kind of not present. She wasn’t really shown the kind of love that I gave my kids, or that Dylan has had his whole life from his parents.
It was tough for me to figure out how to be that. I had to cut myself off. It’s like you have to cut your heart off.
That second day, we did the scene in the hallway, but that was also the same day we shot the scene where I hug him in bed. We went from the beginning of the film, where she has absolutely no idea what she’s doing and they’re ripping each other’s heads off, to having this emotional moment toward the end of the film when she’s finally fallen into the role. It’s the first time we hear him call her “Mom,” in that scene in his bedroom. It was an emotional roller coaster that day.
But for me as an actor, that was fun because those are the days that I crave, to go in and do something powerful in those kinds of scenes. That’s the day I go home and actually get some sleep.
Dylan, what was it like being coached by Jaime?
Dylan Friedman: It was good, but it was definitely challenging. There were times where, like she said, mid-scene she’s screaming at me. But she’d also grab my face and go, “Say it again.” She got me into that moment. It was great coaching, but it was tough.
Jaime Pressly: It was tough. It was like throwing him into the fire, throwing him into the deep end of the pool. But we had to do it, and we had to get him there. I think he killed it. He got there.
Andy Palmer: You really see that there’s a progression. I can watch the film and know what day we were on, because you see the thing that I think any amazing actor does: They’re making choices. They make nonverbal choices—the way they move their head, the way they’re moving their hands…
Jaime Pressly: Exactly.
Andy Palmer: As an editor, I’m always looking for those little moments. You see Dylan, as he progresses as an actor, making these very conscious choices that were right for his character. It might be out of order in the movie, but I can see the order in which he became more confident in that realm. That’s really due to Jaime and Johnny and Mike and all those guys helping him out.
